Entries tagged with: Grimes

Photographer Dominick Mastrangelo has been contributing to BrooklynVegan for years, and this year he did most of his shooting in Chicago (as well as other places, like Finland's Flow Festival). Now that the year is coming to a close, Dominick has put together his favorite 14 photos that he took this year, as well as a list of ten records he's kept on heavy rotation throughout 2014. Check out more of his shots, and browse his album list, below...

The FADER always has some year-end coverage, but for the past 15 years they didn't publish a ranked year-end list. This year however, they ranked their 116 favorite songs of 2014 (find out why) and it's a diverse list that manages to sing the praises of iLoveMakonnen, Tinashe, Alex G, Florida Georgia Line, Enrique Iglesias, Bleachers, Ricky Eat Acid, YG, Toni Braxton & Babyface, Nothing, Grimes, Parquet Courts, Run the Jewels and Grouper all in the same damn list.

Grimesnew single with Blood Diamonds, "Go," now has a video, co-directed by Claire herself with her brother Mac Boucher under the collaborative name Roco-Prime. It's like some kind of Tarsem/NABIL collaboration as imagined by Hype Williams. There's swordplay and flowing scarves in the desert, hypercolor slo-mo dancing, splashing about...pretty much the whole gambit of over-the-top music video imagery. Also: voice of Solid Snake David Hayter reading from Dane's Inferno. But what does it mean? Claire offers some insight:

It's our take on Dante's inferno. The circles of hell reflect more contemporary issues though. We shot a bunch at the salton sea which is basically an apocalyptic wasteland filled with dead fish because of human carelessness, the bullet hole hallway a la korn freak on a leash etc etc. If you look closely you can find clues. Haha, but in the usual fashion it is also abstract enough to just be a trippy visual accompaniment to the song.

[Slowdive's] entire audience appears to be holding its breath, immersed in the British shoegaze band's ocean of sound. The three guitarists--Neil Halstead, Christian Savill, and Rachel Goswell--are urged on by the warm throb of Nick Chaplin's bass and the vigorous drumming of Simon Scott. It's a relief to hear a drummer at the festival who isn't playing in boring old 4/4. Goswell, resplendent in a silver dress and smiling shyly, sings the hook to "Crazy for You," its circular guitar figure still captivating 20 years later. Unfortunately, her pretty voice sounds paper thin in the mix of "Machine Gun" but the reverb-y guitars sound great. During "Souvlaki Space Station," left-handed Savill plays a solo in which his slide guitar sighs as if in post-coital bliss.

One wonders whether most of these teens and twentysomethings have any idea who Slowdive is. After all, the band broke up--or, more accurately morphed into Mojave 3--when many of the attendees were in diapers. Is Slowdive cashing in on the reunion dollar or will they produce new material? One hopes for the latter. The band's multiple guitargasms are indescribably majestic and beautiful. The five-piece doesn't take the opportunity to play "Visions of LA," but "Alison" and a cover of Syd Barrett's "Golden Hair" end the set on a highpoint. Before they depart, Goswell announces they'll be back in November. Can't wait. [Under the Radar]

LA's 2014 FYF Fest went down over the weekend (Saturday, 8/23 & Sunday, 8/24) with a killer lineup that included Phoenix, The Strokes, Interpol, Grimes, Slowdive, Slint, The Blood Brothers, Future Islands, Against Me!, Ty Segall, Boris, Run the Jewels, Darkside, Flying Lotus, Blood Orange, Haim, Murder City Devils, Four Tet, The Bronx, Deafheaven, La Dispute, Joyce Manor, Joanna Gruesome, Angel Olsen and many more. We've got pictures of a handful of the bands from both days, in this post.

More pics, with a stream of a new song by rapper Kosha Dillz where he namedrops 60 bands that played FYF, below...

Yesterday, Pitchfork posted their top 200 tracks of the decade so far, and today they've listed the top 100 albums to have come out between 2010-2014. There's some surprises on there. For example, I didn't expect to see Bon Iver's self-titled, their #1 album of 2011 and with a score of 9.5, rank as low as #27 on this list. I was also surprised to see Chief Keef make it but not, say, Shabazz Palaces or Schoolboy Q. And there's a few other glaring omissions: nothing by The National? Grizzly Bear? One thing that will surprise no one though, is their #1 pick.

It's not just you: Over the last five years, there's been a seismic shift in the way we engage with music. We tweet, tumbl, stream, and share our favorite songs; we scour dead links and navigate obtrusive pop-ups for the newest mixtapes; we watch our music videos on Youtube and Vevo. We watched the explosion of EDM, the birth of drill, the rise and fall of chillwave. We debated how to pronounce FKA twigs, whether the album was dead, and where Bobby Shmurda's hat went. We met Kendrick Lamar, Frank Ocean, Grimes, Jessie Ware, Disclosure, Miguel, and Charli XCX. We saw LCD Soundsystem break up, Neutral Milk Hotel reunite, and My Bloody Valentine release a new album--a shooting star if there ever was one. [Pitchfork]

By the end of this year it will be halfway through the current decade, and to mark that, Pitchfork is posting lists of the best tracks, albums, and videos of the decade so far, this week. Today, they put out their list of the top 200 tracks. Like most of Pitchfork's 'top tracks' lists, it ranges from big names to underdogs in indie, electronic, hip hop and more, plus a few huge radio-pop songs sprinkled in. Can you guess what made #1?

"There was a certain amount of science to it. An entire week of work experience students left the office thinking that cutting-edge music journalism in 2014 mostly involves calculating which bands have been mentioned most in NME in the past two years, then hunting out references to the bands that influenced those acts online and finally adding up the number of times each influence came up. This gave us a rough list which our editorial team - heads swimming with all of the bands that Wolf Alice (or whoever) have raved on about over 4am ciders - then took to the pub, tore into shreds, fought and shouted about and finally reconstructed in the rundown of 100 you see in the mag today. The Beatles didn't make it. Sorry." [NME[

NME went ahead and listed who they think the 100 most influential musicians and bands are (their latest cover story). Radiohead topped the list. Read the rest with justifications at NME, or just look at their full list below...

By the time I arrived on Sunday, Speedy Ortiz were well into their set on the Blue stage and playing the fan favorite "Taylor Swift." Speedy's recorded material has always oozed personality and attitude, and their live show does as well. Frontwoman Sadie Dupuis comfortably ad libbed lyrics with various shouts and word extensions throughout their set. The band polished off their live-wire performance with a couple of tunes from their Real Hair EP and their new song "Bigger Party." -ZP

Over on the Green stage, Bandcamp sweethearts Mutual Benefit simultaneously opened up the fest's final day with a few of their sweet, melodic tunes. With an entire live band backing frontman Jordan Lee's soft-spoken, almost falsetto vocal range and feather light lyrics. The crowd was surprisingly full for the early afternoon set, and many closer to the band seemed to know every word off of its debut studio album Love's Crushing Diamond. Highlights included a heartfelt rendition of "Golden Wake" and a take on "Advanced Falconry" perfect for warming people up for the rest of the day. -AG

DIIV kicked off the first show on the Red stage yesterday and played for a fairly large early afternoon crowd, beginning their set with a new song called Follow . The band jangly guitar indie pop made for some excellent summer jams. Keeping with that theme, they played a few tracks that showed hints of surf rock, and the lead singer Zachary Cole Smith wore a colorful flamenco looking shirt that Prince might be proud of. -MM

Perfect Pussy

Syracuse rockers Perfect Pussy drew a huge crowd on Sunday, surprising even lead singer Meredith Graves. Their set was short but powerful, not unusual for a band whose last record, 2014's Say Yes To Love, clocks in at around twenty one minutes. After a lengthy sound check, a rarity for the band, they didn't waste time getting into their set. While they sounded excellent, the real highlight of the show was, as always, Graves' fantastic performance as a vocalist and frontwoman. Her theatrical dancing stood in delicious contrast to the pure energy of each song. The crowd barely got a chance to calm down from one pit before another song crashed down, opening up an even bigger floor. Although the band seemed a bit flustered by the crowd and the midday heat, they never let up, quickly running through hits off of their debut album and demo, touching on fan favorites such as "Interference Fits," "Advance Upon The Real," "I," and "II." -AG

Deafheaven

Next up were Deafheaven on the Green stage. The California crew began their set with the glimmering Sunbather opener "Dream House," and proceeded to match the weather with equal parts soaring shoegaze and metal assault. Lead guitarist Kerry McCoy expertly segued the band into "Irresistible," and then to "Sunbather." That block was followed by their spacey new tune "From The Kettle Unto The Coil," which contains a traditional metal breakdown in the middle. George Clark's guttural shrieks glided effortlessly over the riffage, and he's quite the frontman too, thrashing about the stage. Deafheaven closed their incredibly moving performance with "Unrequited" off of 2011's Roads to Judah. Not all "metal" acts are appropriate for a daytime slot, but Deafheaven were damn near a perfect fit. -ZP

After Deafheaven, I headed over to the blue stage to catch a bit of Isaiah Rashad's set. As one of three TDE rappers of the day (along with Kendrick Lamar and Schoolboy Q), Rashad stood out with his southern flow, relaxed vibe, and raspy delivery. He drew a huge crowd, who danced and sang along to "Heavenly Father" and "Menthol" off of this year's Cilvia Demo. You can hear a bit of guys like Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rapper in Rashad's delivery, and with the amount that the crowd was feeling it, it'll only be a matter of time before he rises up to their level. -ZP

Continuing the hip hop block, next up was Earl Sweatshirt on the red stage. His DJ played a few songs before Earl came out -- Chief Keef's "3Hunna," Tyler the Creator's "Sandwitches," etc. -- and when he finally took the stage, Earl had the crowd sing along to about half of "Don't Stop Believin'" as it played over the PA. When he actually got started, the first song Earl played was "20 Wave," accompanied by Odd Future associate Domo Genesis. Downtempo tunes from Doris hit much harder than I expected them to, and the crowd was hyped on it. He took things to another level by playing the very heavy "Kill" from his debut album Earl. Earl's been touring quite a bit lately and that definitely showed in his live performance -- he's become a showman and has so much control over the audience. Before playing "Molasses," he had the crowd repeat its hook back -- "Ima fuck the freckles off your face, bitch." -ZP

Dum Dum Girls had some minor technical difficulties before starting their set, but once things got going they sounded great. As usual, they were in matching outfits, and played a mix of the old and new. My personal favorite from the set was "Rimbaud Eyes", an excellent single from their recent Too True LP. -MM

One of the most anticipated sets of the day by many was Schoolboy Q's late afternoon performance on the Green stage. The party rapper got things started with his hit "Hands on the Wheel," and then jumped to 2014's Oxymoron for "What They Want" and "Gangsta." He reached back to his debut studio album Setbacks for "Druggys wit Hoes," and the crowd went nuts. Q's a fine addition to any festival, offering hyped-up vibes and heavy beats. -ZP

Craving some shade, I went to check out Jon Hopkins over at the Blue stage. His seemingly dance-focused set was based upon a series of glitchy Immunity tracks, including bits of "We Disappear," "Open Eye Signal," "Breathe This Air," and others. The Blue stage was simultaneously the place for those who wanted to dance and others who'd rather take a seat and nod their heads along. -ZP

I was fortunate to see Majical Cloudz perform as an opener for The Soft Moon a few years ago and it was great seeing how much more confident the duo had become since then. Frontman Devon Welsh sported his never changing plain white tee and black pants and started a few songs with countdowns that the crowd enthusiastically chanted along with. I was hoping Welsh would later join Grimes on stage during her set to play their collaborative "Nightmusic" from Grimes' Visions album, or maybe their recently unearthed demo about an obese cat. Grimes played the former, but Welsh was nowhere in sight. -MM

Shoegaze legends Slowdive played their first U.S. show as a reunited band this Sunday. While the crowd seemed to mostly be waiting for headliner Kendrick Lamar, who was playing on the same stage a few hours later, their true fans did make themselves known, responding enthusiastically to classics off of their unforgettable 1993 release, Souvlaki. Slowdive lived up to the precedent set by fellow reunited UK shoegazers, My Bloody Valentine, playing a loud, intense set. Songs like "When the Sun Hits," gained a heavy, aggressive edge, giving Deafheaven a run for its money in respect to ferocity. Softer tunes like "Alison" lulled the crowd into a collective bliss. -AG

After that on the Blue stage it was DJ Spinn, who was initially going to perform with his collaborator DJ Rashad before Rashad's untimely passing, but decided to stay on the festival and perform his own set which Chicago Tribute called "a thrilling display of the "ghetto house" sound that has thrived in the city's South Side neighborhoods for the better part of two decades."

Canadian pop sensation Grimes was the penultimate performer of Pitchfork 2014, an honor she did not take lightly. In addition to running through classics, Grimes treated the crowd to two relatively new songs and one for which she was still working out the lyrics. She had seemingly boundless energy, dancing feverishly throughout her entire set. She seemed to be having the time of her life, playing with multiple synthesizers and vocal reverb to create the image of DJ set. This was clearly a different Grimes than we have seen in the past - she was confident, loud, and ready to party with the audience. Fans went crazy for Grimes classics such as "Circumambient" and "Oblivion," and stayed dancing even for her lesser-known songs, such as "Be a Body." However, the highlight of the set was undoubtedly the last few songs. After premiering a new song on which she had just completed production to a rousing response from the audience, Grimes treated the crowd to "Phone Sex," a Blood Diamonds song on which she is featured. She then broke out her dance floor-ready hit, "Go," to the delight of the audience. It was clear when the drop hit in "Go" that this was a new, supersized Grimes, ready to take the world's dance clubs by storm and become the next EDM sweetheart. Always the performer, she closed out her set with her biggest hit to date, 2012's "Genesis." -AG

Sunday headliner and festival bookend Kendrick Lamar put on a helluva show with his excellent four-piece band behind him. Lamar began to hold court with the good vibes "Money Trees" and very live "Backseat Freestyle" off of good kid, m.A.A.d city. The pro band managed to handle every little nuance contained in Kendrick's beats, and there are plenty of 'em. Unlike most of his peers, Lamar isn't much for cutting songs halfway through. Almost all tunes, with the exception of "The Art of Peer Pressure," were performed in their entirety. Virtually undisputed party song "Swimming Pools (Drank)" came next, followed by the boom bap of "m.A.A.d city." The last tune I heard before splitting was the chilled out "Sing About Me, I'm Dying Of Thirst." Kendrick provided the perfect ending to the day and the entire festival. -ZP

Day 1 pics are HERE and HERE. Day 2 pics are HERE and HERE. More of day 3 below...

Grimes recently wrote a song with Blood Diamonds titled "Go" that was supposed to be for Rihanna, but when the pop singer turned it down, Grimes decided to keep it for herself and debuted it at Governors Ball. Now the studio version has been released and it's a big pop song (complete with an EDM-style drop) that you can definitely tell was written for a star. It's still got some Grimes-ness to it though. Check it out for yourself below. Not many details yet, but a new full length is in the works for Grimes too.

Outkast's much-anticipated set (like many of their other festival sets this year) started with both Big Boi and Andre 3000 on stage for tons of favorites right off the bat including "B.O.B.," "Gasoline Dreams, "ATLiens," "Rosa Parks," "Aquemini," "Ms. Jackson," and more. Then Big Boi did three songs alone, Andre did three alone (including "Hey Ya!" for which Janelle Monae came on stage to dance), and then another Outkast set. The second set ended with "The Whole World," for which they brought out Killer Mike to rap his verse. Pictures of all artists mentioned (and more), plus Outkast's setlist and a video of "Hey Ya!" are in this post.

GovBall continues today (6/7) with Diarrhea Planet taking the stage in about two hours (12:45 PM), and other sets include Jack White, Spoon, The Strokes, Disclosure, Broken Bells, Chance the Rapper, Deafheaven and more.

As previously mentioned, Jay Z is throwing his Budweiser Made In America Festival in Philly and LA this year, simultaneously on August 30-31. The lineup for Philly has just been announced and includes Kanye West and Kings of Leon as headliners, plus The National, Pharrell, J. Cole, Girl Talk, Spoon, Chromeo, Grimes, De La Soul, Baauer, Danny Brown, YG, Holy Ghost and more. Full lineup below.

As you may know, the 2014 Governors Ball happens at Randall's Island from June 6-8. Individual day line-ups have been announced with Outkast, Phoenix and TV on the Radio headlining Friday (6/6), Jack White, The Strokes and Skrillex headlining Saturday (6/7), and Vampire Weekend and Axwell ^ Ingrosso headining Sunday (6/8). You can check each day's full line-up (though set times are still TBA) below.

Pitchfork Music Festival returns to Chicago's Union Park from July 18-20 and the lineup was just announced. It includes Neutral Milk Hotel, Kendrick Lamar, Beck, Slowdive (their first reunion show in the US so far), Giorgio Morder, Sun Kil Moon, Factory Floor, Death Grips, the Haxan Cloak, Sharon Van Etten, tUnE-yArDs, The Julie Ruin, Grimes, Wild Beasts, DIIV, Ka, Circulatory System, Pusha T, The Range, Mas Ysa and more TBA. Tickets are on sale now.

We already knew that Outkast would be headlining this year's Governors Ball music festival, which goes down on NYC's Randall's Island from June 6-8, and now, one day after the lineup of Firefly Fest was announced, and a few days after we found out who was playing Coachella, the full lineup has been announced. It includes Jack White, Vampire Weekend, Phoenix, Interpol, TV on the Radio, Julian Casablancas, Disclosure, Spoon, Broken Bells, Damon Albarn, James Blake, Neko Case, The Kills, Grimes, Janelle Monae, Tyler the Creator, Washed Out, Earl Sweatshirt, Kurt Vile, Chance the Rapper, Deafheaven, Run the Jewels and many more.

There were tons of New Year's Eve shows here in NYC, as well as around the rest of the country, and down in Mexico, the Young Turks label threw a party on the beach in popular tourist site Tulum (famous, among other things, for its ruins). It literally went all night, kicking off with some of the label's DJs at 8 PM, followed by Sampha, John Talabot, Chairlift, The xx, Grimes, SBTRKT, Koreless, Pional, Four Tet and others playing past 11 AM New Year's Day.

During SBTRKT's set, he revealed an unreleased Jessie Ware collaboration, "Runaway." You can stream that, along with a video featuring clips of multiple sets from the show, and a few more pics, below...

Whether it's to criticize her or praise her, it's hard to deny that people like talking about Grimes' musical opinions. Her top 10 albums of 2012 list included the most pop (Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber) AND the least pop (Swans), and she totally meant it too. She's defended Beyonce, Mariah Carey, and pop music in general, and denied accusations of trolling when her Boiler Room set included Taylor Swift, Maria Carey, Ramones, Skrillex, and others.

Grimes has now published a list to her tumblr of her favorite songs of all time. It continues her trend of pulling from pop and experimental music with songs from Burial, Mariah Carey, Joanna Newsom, Beyonce, Mazzy Star, Skrillex, Animal Collective, Butthole Surfers, Paramore and more. It's not only newer stuff though, she's also got Patsy Cline, Prince, and Enya, among others.

Grimes, a well-known fashion fan (she co-hosted the red carpet at the VMAs this year), is currently making headlines for saying that she is annoyed at vegans who are annoying and tell she is not vegan enough, because she is a vegan that thinks it's okay to not be vegan 100% of the time. She wrote a tumblr post that reads:

this is something i was anticipating and have been meaning to address for a long time:

Part of the reason I posted the ben and jerry's thing is because I like to encourage people towards a type of veganism that is inviting and accepting. For the longest time I was vegan but I just wouldn't say I was because of the bad reputation of veganism. most of the vegans i know are dogmatic assholes, and it completely turns people off.

I believe more people would be drawn to having more ethical diets if they didn't feel bullied to do so, or if they felt they were entering a welcoming community.

My brand of veganism is one wherein if your grandparents have no idea what you are talking about then you eat their beef stew rather than upset or confuse them. or if you really want to have cake with an egg in it on the holidays then you have that rather than just not being a vegan because you don't want to give up occasionally having something that you love.

Ben and Jerrys is the only brand of ice cream i ever eat. their cows are treated ethically and beyond that they put a ton of money into researching green hydrocarbon freezers that would use alternative refrigerants which (unlike current freezer gases) do not contribute to global warming. they're also working on a bunch of other initiatives like using completely renewable materials in packaging.

this comment is why no one wants to be vegan. unlike this dude, i would like to fully encourage everyone to be vegan rather than scare them away. I love being vegan. my skin is better, i have more energy, i feel really healthy and i get sick way less than i used too and I'm not contributing to factory farming. that said, I also occasionally enjoy things i used to eat because it makes me feel good and i am less discouraged about not eating those things the rest of the time.

<3

This post was spawned by a previous post that said she would put veganism on hold to try the new Ben and Jerry's flavor:

holy fuck there is a new flavour of ben and jerrys

1 day hiatus from veganism is being had starting NOw

also excuse the expletive, i try to keep the blog all ages but this is a pretty big deal plus i dunno honestly i knew the f bomb by the time i was 5 i would be shocked if u didnt already know it and yet have the reading comprehension skills to digest the rest of this post

Rapper and man of many industries Jay Z has released a new Rick Owens-designed jacket (pictured above), which is obnoxiously made entirely of crocodile skin and which is being sold for $58,000 (though at least they're donating 100% of sales to the Shawn Carter Scholarship Foundation). The jacket is part of Jay's new holiday collection on Barneys, which includes other (slightly) less expensive items too. Happy Holidays everyone!

The second weekend of Austin's 2013 ACL Festival went down this past Friday (10/11) and Saturday (10/12) (Sunday was cancelled) with the second day giving us sets from The Cure, Passion Pit, Kendrick Lamar, Shouting Matches (Justin Vernon's blues band), Wilco, Grimes, Junip, Haim, Autre Ne Veut, Parquet Courts and more. Pictures of those artists (except none of Kendrick), and others from weekend 2 day 2 are in this post.

If you haven't been keeping up with our coverage of the festival, check out weekend 2 day 1 pics here and here, and weekend 1 pics here. More of weekend 2 day 2 below...

Last year around the holidays, Adam Horne of Brooklyn's Bear Ceuse (who released an album this year) and Animal New York uploaded an album to Soundcloud called Merry Indie X-Mas, which featured hilarious parodies of what it would sound like if famous indie bands did Christmas covers in their own styles. Now he's back with a new one called Indie Kidz Songs! which does the same thing, but for children's songs. Especially funny ones include Chief Keef's "Old MacDonald," Vampire Weekend's "I'm A Little Teapot," Alt-J's "Row Row Row Your Boat" and Pixies' "B-I-N-G-O." But they're all really funny and if you need to kill 6-ish minutes of your time with some hipster-baiting style laughs, stream the album and watch its commercial below.

From many points in Brooklyn, one could look up and see the lit up blimp in the air hovering over the Barclays Center yesterday (8/25). It was where the overhead shots were being filmed during the pre-show which included the big crowds outside around the Brooklyn streets that MTV got closed down to create the red carpet for the VMAs....

A red carpet, set up on Dean Street near Flatbush Avenue, was completely invisible to many non-ticketed fans and the general public who were mainly cordoned in a pen at the Best Buy on Atlantic Avenue between Fort Greene Place and Sixth Avenue.

Another penned area, at Sixth Avenue and Bergen Street, gave a small group of fans a distant peek at the carpet, but it was still a full city block away.

"Obviously they can't let everyone in for security reasons, but we can't see anything at all," said Donna Hall, 28, who came from Queens. "I've been out here with my friends since 3 p.m. and we've been trying to find the best vantage point possible, but we settled here because at least we could see a glimpse of the red carpet. [DNA Info]

Daft Punk didn't perform, but they did walk the red carpet and sit in the audience in their masks which they also wore to present 'Best Female Music Video' with Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers. They also debuted part of the video for "Lose Yourself to Dance."

Eminem also pulled a Jay Z and announced his new album, MMLP2 (the sequel to 2000's Marshall Mathers LP), in a commercial that aired during the VMAs. The album was executive produced by Dr. Dre and Rick Rubin, and it's due out November 5. Meanwhile, the single, "Berserk," will drop this Tuesday (8/27).

If you watched, what did you think? Should Miley Cyrus stop being so trashy? Should Robin Thicke stop being so creepy? Should Kanye stop being so serious? Does Justin Timberlake have really long arms? Does anyone really care that *NSYNC showed up (for a minute and a half)? If you didn't watch, or need a refresher, some videos from the night are below...

Traffic hasn't been as bad around the Barclays Center as opponents thought it would be when the Brooklyn arena was first announced. We think that may not be true this Sunday (8/25) though as MTV takes over the room to film the live telecast of the VMAs. Everyone from Kanye West to Katy Perry to Daft Punk to Robin Thicke are going to be there or are rumored to be there. Prince is in town. So is Perez Hilton.

The 2013 Video Music Awards are near, and to herald their arrival on Sunday, August 25, MTV is launching the VMA All Access Experience, 5 days of livestreamed performances and VMA moments starting NOW! And, get this, Grimes will be making a special appearance!

...

Show day, however, has got MTV Hive pumped -- not only because the 2013 Video Music Awards features the likes of Lady Gaga, Justin Timberlake and Kanye West, but because Grimes, along with designer Rachel Antonoff, will co-host MTV Style's Red Carpet Report (6 p.m. ET Sunday). Perhaps she'll wear one of her pussy rings? One can dream.

Meanwhile, Justin Timberlake will be receiving the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award during the VMAs, and it's been announced that his 'History of Rap' partnerJimmy Fallon will be the one presenting it to him. Justin is also rumored to be reuniting on stage at the VMAs with his old boy band *NSYNC. Maybe you've heard of them.